Ifparlmpttl of ffionuttme aitli Stahnr 


Organization 

/A i iP ^ 

of the Bureau of Immigration 
and Naturalization 


».» 


November , 1907 




» K« 






















































% 


■c 

7 ' 




—*c 


'/ • 




V 


> V. 

v 


<T 



WASHINGTON 

Government Printing Office 
1907 



Dfc 


V * 

r\ 



07 


I 












Q RG AN IZATION OF 

THE BUREAU OF 
IMMIGRATION AND 
NATURALIZATION 


Dpparlmrnt nf (Crnmnerr? and iCahitr 

SECRETARY; 

Hon. Oscar S. Straus 

ASSISTANT SECRETARY: 

Lawrence O. Murray 


BUREAU OF IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION 

Commissioner-General of Immigration 
FRANK P. SARGENT 

Assistant Commissioner-General 


FRANK H. LARNED 



Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization 


B 


#§§# 


Growth, 
of functions 


ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT 

Y SECTION 7 of the Immigration Act of March 
3, 1891 (Stat. E., vol. 26, p. 1084), there was 
created in the Treasury Department the ‘‘Office 
of Superintendent of Immigration,” which was 
the first attempt at a centralized national control of immi¬ 
gration. That act provided that, in addition to the Super¬ 
intendent of Immigration, there .should be a chief clerk 
and two clerks assigned to the said office. From this small 
beginning has gradually grown the Bureau to a description 
of which this brochure is addressed. 

The scope and character of the duties imposed upon 
the Bureau and its chief have been enormously increased 
with each addition to the immigration laws. 
By the act of June 6, 1900 (Stat. L., vol. 31, 
p. 611), the enforcement of the Chinese-exclu- 
sion laws was also vested in the head of the office and 
service, whose title had been changed to Commissioner- 
General of Immigration by the act of March 2, 1895 
(Stat. L., vol. 28, p. 764). The act of June 29, 1906 
(Stat. E., vol. 34, pt. 1, p. 596), provided for a change 
of the title of the Bureau to Bureau of Immigration and 
Naturalization, and authorized the establishment therein 
of a Division of Naturalization, for the enforcement of 
the naturalization laws. I11 the act of February 20, 1907 
(Stat. E. , vol. 34, p. 898), provision was made for the 
establishment in the Bureau of Immigration and Natu¬ 
ralization of a Division of Information, with the object 
of promoting a beneficial distribution of aliens admitted to 
the country, by collecting and distributing among them 
reliable data concerning the advantages offered settlers in 

( 3 ) 




Department of Commerce and Labor 


the different sections of the country. This, briefly, is an 
account of the origin and development of the Bureau. 

DUTIES OF THE BUREAU 

The Bureau was originally established with the object 
of effecting a national control of the immigration of aliens 
to the United States, jurisdiction of the subject having, 
prior to March 3, 1891, been left largely to the various 
States. Succeeding that date, Congress from time to 
time modified the character and extended the scope of 
the immigration laws, until the act of February 20, 1907, 
was passed, being practically a reenactment, with numer¬ 
ous changes, of all legislation on the subject. That act, 
relating to the admission, or exclusion and deportation, 
and the distribution of aliens in general, the various 
statutes concerning the admission and exclusion of Chinese 
persons, and the several enactments on the subject of 
naturalizing foreigners as citizens of the United States, 
constitute the body of the law with the enforcement of 
which the Bureau is charged, which may be found in the 
United States Revised Statutes and Statutes at Large, as 
follows: 

IMMIGRATION ACTS 

General Immigration Ad —February 20, 1907; 34 Stat., pt. 1, 
p. 898. 

Act of March 3, 1875; 18 Stat., pt. 3, p. 477. 

Act of August 3, 1882; 22 Stat., p. 214. 

Act of February 26, 1885; 23 Stat., p. 332. 

Act of February 23, 1887 ; 24 Stat., p. 414. 

Act of October 19, 1888; 25 Stat., p. 565. 

Act of March 3, 1891 ; 26 Stat., p. 1084. 

Act of February 15, 1893 (sec. 7) ; 27 Stat., p. 449. 

( 4 ) 



Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization 


Act of March 3, 1893 ; 27 Stat., p. 569. 

Act of August 18, 1894; 28 Stat., p. 390. 

Act of March 3, 1903; 32 Stat., pt. 1, p. 1213. 
Act of March 22, 1904; 33 Stat., pt. 1, p. 144. 
Act of February 3, 1905 ; 33 Stat., pt. 1, p. 684 


NATURALIZATION ACTS 

General Naturalization Act —June 29, 1906; 34 Stat., p. 596. 

Sections 2166, 2169, 2171, and 2174, U. S. Revised Statutes. 

Act of May 6, 1882 ; 22 Stat., p. 58. 

Act of July 26, 1894; 28 Stat., p. 123. 

Act of June 29, 1906; 34 Stat., pt. 1, p. 630. 

CHINKSn-KXCLUSION ACTS 

General Chinese-Exclnsion Act .—Act of May 6, 1882, 22 Stat., 
p. 58, as amended and added to by act of July 5, 1884, 23 Stat., 
P- 115- 

Act of September 13, 1888; 25 Stat., p. 476. 

Act of May 5, 1892 ; 27 Stat., p. 25. 

Act of November 3, 1893; 28 Stat., p. 7. 

Act of March 3, 1901; 31 Stat.,vp. 1093. 

Act of April 29, 1902, 32 Stat., pt. 1, p. 176, as amended and 
reenacted by section 5 of the deficiency act of April 27, 1904, 33 
Stat., pt. 1, p. 428. 


Number 
of officers 


To enforce these laws a force of more than 1,300 offi¬ 
cers, scattered throughout the United States, is employed, 
and for certain purposes connected with the 
administration of the naturalization laws over 
3,000 clerks of courts are quasi-subject to the 
control of the Bureau at Washington. The affairs of this 
vast organization must be carefully supervised, and the 
efforts of the emplo} r ees must be directed and the results 
of their labors used so as to further the common cause of 
an efficient and economical enforcement of the laws. That 
is the work in which the headquarters of the service at 

( 5 ) 











Department of Commerce and Labor 


Washington—the Bureau proper—is constantly engaged. 
The effective performance of this task requires an exten¬ 
sive and comprehensive system of organization. 


ORGANIZATION AND METHODS 


\ 


The Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization is 
systematically and practically organized—is a business 
institution, conducted under modern methods, and it is 
manned with a corps of intelligent, efficient, zealous em¬ 
ployees, in the selection of the members of which great 
care has been exercised. At the head of this organization 
is the Commissioner-General of Immigration, and rank¬ 
ing second to him is the Assistant Commissioner-General, 
who also fills the position of Chief Clerk. 

The work assigned the Bureau falling into three natu¬ 
ral and well-defined branches, its organization is arranged 
within three distinct divisions: The Immigra- 
° pe ^ the tion and Chinese Division, which has charge 
of the enforcement of the general immigration 
laws and those relating to Chinese aliens, and is the main 
part of the Bureau, which has gradually been evolved as 
the body of law on those subjects has been increased, be¬ 
ginning with the creation in 1891 of the office of the 
Superintendent of Immigration in the Treasury Depart¬ 
ment ; the Division of Naturalization, which was organ¬ 
ized in pursuance of the act of June 29, 1906, and has 
jurisdiction of the enforcement of the laws relating to the 
naturalization of aliens; and the Division of Information, 
established under the act of February 20, 1907, with the 
object of assisting in a proper distribution of aliens ad¬ 
mitted to the United States. The three divisions are 
manned and organized as follows: 

( 6 ) 






Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization 


This, the oldest and principal division of the 
Bureau—until recently the entire Bureau— 
quite naturally, is directly presided over by the 
Commissioner-General. In his absence the 
official designated Assistant Commissioner- 
General and Chief Clerk acts as Commissioner- 
General. This division is the headquarters 
of the Immigration Service at large, and it must sys¬ 
tematize and harmonize, by a detailed supervision, the 
efforts of all the field officers in such a manner as to 
insure the attainment of maximum results with a mini¬ 
mum amount of labor and expense. The division is, with 
respect to its employees and the work upon which they 
are engaged, subdivided into sections, as follows: 

The Taw Section is in charge of the legal adviser of the 
Bureau, who has assigned him an assistant law officer and 
two stenographer-clerks. To this .section are 
Law Section referred all questions of law arising in the 

course of the administration of the immigra¬ 
tion and Chinese-exclusion acts, and any complicated 
questions of fact, involving the application of the Statutes 
to peculiar or unusual circumstances; and it is also charged 
with the preparation of such rules and regulations as are 
promulgated in enforcing the acts mentioned. 

The work of the Correspondence Section is directed by 
a chief and his assistant, the former also acting as Chief 
Clerk of the Bureau in the absence of the As- 

Correspond-- s i s tant Commissioner-General and Chief Clerk. 
ence Section . 

There are assigned this section seven stenogra¬ 
pher-clerks, who are constantly engaged in the preparation 
of letters and other written communications and orders. 
The correspondence thus conducted is of almost unlimited 

( 7 ) 


The Immigra¬ 
tion and 
Chinese 
Division 


C§C§0§C§C§§3§3§3§3§3 

0§0^0§0§§3§3§3§3§3 








Department of Commerce and Labor 


extent and scope; for not only must the Bureau’s super¬ 
vision of the field force be exercised largely by means of 
written communications, but the other branches of the 
Government and private persons are constantly in corre¬ 
spondence with the Bureau on innumerable subjects con¬ 
nected with the enforcement of the laws. 


r\ 


The Files and Record Section, under the supervision of 
a chief and assistant chief, to whom are assigned four 

clerks, has charge of the recording of all letters 

Files and Rec- ,, . ,. , 

, 0 .. and other written communications received, 

ord Section 

and the systematic filing of such documents, 
with copies of the replies thereto, after they have been 
handled by the various other sections of the division. 
The correspondence to be filed is arranged under a com¬ 
plete system of numbers and subnumbers, is filed flat 
(i. e., without folding), and is indexed by the card 
method, not only the names of the correspondents and of 
the persons mentioned in the letters, but also the subjects 
being recorded in the index; thus every communication 

is so placed that, with the least hint as to its purport, it 

* 

can instantly be withdrawn from the files. 

The Statistical Section has charge of compiling and 
publishing the large variety of statistical matter of which 
a record is kept at the various ports, concern¬ 
ing the admission or exclusion of aliens, the 
classes to which the aliens belong, etc. The 
chief statistician of the Bureau has charge of this sec¬ 
tion, and there are assigned him an assistant statistician 
and two clerks. The arduous and painstaking character 
of the work done in this section is but partly indicated 
by the tables and charts on immigration issued period¬ 
ically by the Bureau. 


Statistical 

Section 


( 8 ) 




Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization 


Jtccounts 

Section 


In tlie Accounts Section, conducted by a chief account¬ 
ant and his assistant, with two bookkeeper-clerks and a 
stenographer-clerk, are audited, recorded, and 
prepared for approval all accounts and vouch¬ 
ers covering the expenses of conducting the 
Immigration Service. The accounts of the various field 
officers are carefully scrutinized and checked, and the 
utmost care is exercised to insure that each and every 
expenditure made is legally and technically correct and 
has been approved by proper authority. 

The Chinese Certificate Section is conducted by a spe¬ 
cial Chinese inspector designated to direct the perform- 
Chinese ance by immigration officers of such duties 

Certificate relating to the enforcement of the Chinese - 
Section exclusion laws as, prior to the establishment 

of the Department of Commerce and Labor (by the 
act of February 14, 1903, 32 Stat., p. 825), were dis¬ 
charged by the various collectors of internal revenue 
located throughout the country. In this section are filed 
the duplicates of the certificates of residence issued to 
Chinese persons under the Chinese registration acts of 
1892 and 1893 anc l th e regulations of the Department 
established thereunder, and all records relating thereto; 
and the inspector in charge considers and adjudicates ap¬ 
plications for certificates in lieu of those unavoidably lost 
or destroyed, and verifies all certificates presented by de¬ 
parting Chinese laborers. Because of the fact that the files 
of this section contain much evidence that must constantly 
be used by the law officers in considering Chinese appeals, 
its work is closely related to that of the Law Section. 

There are assigned to the Immigration and Chinese 
Division of the Bureau two messengers and an assistant 


messenger. 


(9) 





Department of Commerce and Labor 


Elasticity of 
O rga nization 


From the foregoing it will be noted that there are in 
this division of the Bureau several persons who, by train¬ 
ing and experience, are capable of conducting 
the affairs of each section. In addition to this, 
just so far as possible, the employees of the 
different sections are familiarized with the work done in 
other sections, so that the force is sufficiently elastic to 
be readily adjusted to the varying conditions that arise in 
the course of administration, and it is possible always to 
combine the force in such a manner as to meet an unusual 
increase in any particular branch of the work. Each 
employee is, just so far as practicable, trained in such 
manner that, while he is made a specialist upon some 
particular part of the work, he also gains a general knowl¬ 
edge of another branch or other branches thereof, and 
thus there is produced the combination of specialization 
and generalization which makes possible the accomplish¬ 
ment of so much by so small a force of employees. 

The personnel of this division consists of a 
chief, an assistant chief, 19 clerks, a messen¬ 
ger, and an assistant messenger. In addition, 
there are more than 3,000 clerks of courts 
throughout the country who, so far as natu¬ 
ralization matters are concerned, are quasi¬ 
subject to the jurisdiction of the division. 


The 

Naturaliza¬ 

tion 

Division 


C§I^C§C§C§§3§3§3§3§3 

C§0§C§(§C§§3§3§3§3§3 


The Naturalization Division carries on an extensive cor¬ 
respondence with clerks of courts, United States district 
attorneys, and their assistants and examiners assigned 
them for investigation of applications for naturalization, 
and also with private individuals inquiring with regard to 
the requirements of the provisions of law relating to natu¬ 
ralization, the most of which are new and not understood 
by the general public. It also directs the distribution 

(10) 









/ 


Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization 


to the judicial officials of blanks to be used in effecting 
naturalization—declarations of intention, petitions for 
admission to full citizenship, certificates of naturalization 
(the latter prepared on a secret-process paper to prevent 
forgeries and frauds), etc., and issues instructions con¬ 
cerning the making up of such documents. 

These papers are all prepared in duplicate, one copy 
being forwarded to the division by the court officials for 


examination, and filing if found correct; if 
erroneous in any of the numerous details, 
such papers are returned with instructions 


Value of du¬ 
plicate papers 


for their correction. The value of these duplicate doc¬ 
uments, both to the Government and to the persons 
naturalized, is so great that the utmost care must be 
exercised in recording and filing them; and when it is 
remembered that naturalizations are likely to be effected 
at the rate of 75,000 to 100,000 per annum, the magni¬ 
tude of the undertaking can be appreciated. In addition to 
the foregoing, one-half of the amount of the fees collected 
in connection with the naturalization of foreigners must 
be accounted for to the Treasury through the Division of 
Naturalization, and the proper care of, receipting for, and 
depositing of this vast sum of money constitute a part of 
its duties. 


A more accurate title for this division would 
be “ Division of Information and Distribution,” 
as the object sought to be attained in estab¬ 
lishing it was to distribute to parts of the 
United States in need of settlers a portion of 
the large immigration landing in this country 
and concentrating in its large eastern and 


The 

Informa¬ 

tion 

Division 



northern cities. The division is conducted by a chief, an 
assistant chief, five clerks, and a messenger, besides 


(i0 









Department of Commerce an cl L a b o r 


which certain employees of the Immigration Service 
located at the larger ports of entry are under its control. 
It is engaged in collecting from all available sources infor¬ 
mation as to the opportunities offered settlers by the 
different States and Territories and communities within 
them, publishing such information in the leading foreign 
languages, as bulletins, and causing the distribution of 
these bulletins to aliens landing at United States ports. 

In carrying on this work a correspondence, enormous 
both as to variety and extent, must be conducted with 
Wide field individuals and employing interests all over the 
and delicate United States, and with the various immigra- 
duties tion officers and immigration commissions of 

the several States and Territories that are anxious to 
secure settlers. This correspondence must be carefully 
recorded, and the information secured thereby reduced to 
bulletin form, translated and published for distribution; 
and a proper handling of it, in view of the obviously 

i 

delicate character of the duties of the division, is a task 
of considerable magnitude. While every effort is exerted 
to effectuate the purpose for which the division was estab¬ 
lished, care must be exercised to avoid any, even seeming, 
conflict with the general provisions of the immigration 
laws, and also to bring about an administration that is 
absolutely impartial, and fair to all concerned. 


12 




























































































































